Wednesday, September 20, 2023
Commentary: The Reason Most College Professors Lean Left
Studies have consistently shown a pronounced left-leaning political inclination among college professors. For example, a Harvard University survey last year revealed that of the 476 faculty members who responded, around 80 percent identified as “liberal” or “very liberal.” Meanwhile, 16.8 percent considered themselves “moderate,” a mere 1.46 percent identified as “conservative,” and none claimed to be “very conservative.”
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My theory and assumption is that most have never been in the 'real world' since getting their training. They get into the education process and just....stay there. They believe all of their learning would account and fix any problems they had experienced before getting into academia, go through 4 to 8+ years insulated in that environment, then jump straight into being a professor.
ReplyDeleteThe more conservative (and most effective) professors I can recall had spent some time actually working outside of academia before returning to teach.
I agree, I find it difficult to believe some character that has done nothing in life but teaching about a subject without ever have to actually partake in it knows WTF they're teaching... Take a business course for instance, the " professor " has never started a business much less a successful one but he's going to teach about business. As our fake president says Come on Man
DeleteJD
Vola, there is a cultural perpetual motion machine. These academic social cankers have been spawned by progressive parents who send them to progressive universities to get formerly indoctrinated and trained to pass their ideology on. That ensures they get feel good tingles by proposing fantasy produced, absolutely impotent answers to real problems. Obviously, they'll pass on the progressive mindset to their kids and their students.
ReplyDeleteYup.
ReplyDeleteI agree with cj.
Lack of "real world" experience plus concentrating their studies in some of the most useless liberal-leaning areas (art, music, social "sciences", humanities, law).
These people get too influenced by the crazies already in academia who live in their own little bubble.
Having just retired after spending +30 years in academia at all professorial levels (Asst Prof, Assoc Prof, full Prof, tenured, Dept Chair), it was apparent that the people in my field or associated fields who had significant non-governmental industrial experience were the most practical and the least crazy flakey liberal.
They were also more able to work with, and relate to, industrial reps.
Also, academics who came into US academia from places like the old Soviet Satellite Eastern Europe also tend more conservative, having lived within the socialist "paradise".
Why do they "lean" left? The old adage "Those who can't do, teach".
ReplyDeleteThose who can do, those that can't teach
DeleteJD
It's obvious why! The people that do the hiring are filling the open slots with people that believe as they do, to the exclusion of everyone else. It really is that simple.
ReplyDeleteirontomflint
There's a popular saying, "Those who can, do. Those who can't, teach." Translation: teachers can't make it in the real world. My wife has a friend who recently retired as a college professor (she has a husband with the same status). Neither of them has what it takes to function in the real world. My wife gets calls all the time from them asking for advise or how to do something.
ReplyDeletethe most fundamental fact about the ideas of the political left is that they do not work.” So it’s not surprising, Sowell argues, that we “find the left concentrated in institutions where ideas do not have to work in order to survive.”
ReplyDeleteHaving been employed in the Real world and having to perform tasks and solve problems, either my ideas worked or I would not continue to be employed. How anyone can support something and Watch it fail, only to double down and vociferously demand that everyone agree it actually works is mind boggling. They seem to believe that if they can get enough people to Say it works, somehow that makes it true. But what should I expect from people who can say a man can get pregnant?
What Is that? Arrogance? Narcissism? IDK, but whatever it is, I haven't seen it be reversible.
These are the termites infesting the foundations of our Country.
ReplyDeleteI used to be a professor in one of the hard sciences. I think the article explains part of it, but misses part as well.
ReplyDelete- Academics like to understand things with nice systematic theories. Leftist ideologies offer a grand unified theory, whereas true conservatism of the sort you get from Russell Kirk is essentially a rejection of ideology.
- Many universities now require explicitly leftist statements from job applicants in their required documents.
- Leftist professors feel entitled to deny jobs/tenure to those who don't belong to their cult.
- College administrators care about enrollment more than they care about standards or learning. Leftists can go with the flow on this easier because they rationalize that such promotes "equity."
There were a lot of GI bill grads after ww2 that helped keep things normal. Then they retired.
ReplyDeleteBefore WWII, professors tended to be conservative.
DeleteTwo reoccurring themes (that I agree with) :
ReplyDelete(1) self selecting groups tend towards monoculture. Professors pick the next professors with a race to the bottom of how far left they can be.
(2) they've never done anything of value in their life. They only know the ivory tower.
From observation, I would also add professors suffer from the disease of envy. And envy tends to be a left wing trait.